This blog is dedicated to bringing World War II era tank archives to a wider audience, by translating them into English if necessary and providing some historical context to those unfamiliar with it.
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Wednesday, 16 October 2013

Allied Tank Identification

Seems like a pretty standard report. The 296th Infantry Division spotted three new American tanks being used by the Soviets. Let's take a look at these three new tanks.

No mystery here, those are the Stuart (Soviet designation M3 light) and Lee (M3 medium). Seems pretty normal so far, as the Soviets started receiving Lees and Stuarts in 1942. What's the third tank, you may ask? A reasonable guess would be the M4 Sherman, but reality isn't quite as reasonable.

The Germans also came up with an amusing way to help their soldiers identify Allied tanks.

Food! A Valentine's turret is shaped like a pie, a KV-1's turret is shaped like a Bundt cake, a Sherman turret is shaped like a Melon (or a Jewish hat), and the Cruiser III's turret is shaped like a mushroom.